


drowned road rash

by boolam



Series: the precarious domesticity of i. gallagher and m. milkovich [2]
Category: Shameless (US)
Genre: Bathing/Washing, Character Study, Domestic Fluff, Domestic Ian Gallagher/Mickey Milkovich, Fluff, Fluff and Humor, Ian Gallagher Loves Mickey Milkovich, Ian Gallagher is tired, Kissing, M/M, Mickey Milkovich Loves Ian Gallagher, Mickey Milkovich is not in Jail, Mickey Milkovich is tired, No Trevor-bashing, POV Mickey Milkovich, Pointless, Touchy-Feely, aka i write in 3rd person but hyperfixate on what ian's doing so it ends up being from mickey's pov, but of ian's shit, in this fucking household Trevor is chill, playful drowning, playful waterboarding, somebody save mickey milkovich he loves a moron, you rabid dogs
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-12-08
Updated: 2019-12-08
Packaged: 2021-02-25 23:54:33
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,300
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/21724099
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/boolam/pseuds/boolam
Summary: Mickey was fucking beat.
Relationships: Ian Gallagher/Mickey Milkovich
Series: the precarious domesticity of i. gallagher and m. milkovich [2]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1565677
Comments: 5
Kudos: 95





	drowned road rash

Mickey was fucking beat.

Juggling the construction job and putting the time in to work towards getting his GED, he had one series of events on loop in his head: getting home, getting in bed, getting warm, ignoring the smell of bodily fluids and disinfectant - aka the smell of Ian after a long shift. 

(At least the smell of bodily fluids was different from what it was when Ian was working in Boystown; Mickey would be the happiest man alive if he could go fifty lifetimes without ever coming into contact with glitter-lotion slicked skin ever again.)

Mickey knew the whole  _ get your GED  _ spiel from Ian, top to bottom, and taking the initiative to actually get it was the only reprieve he could get to not have his ears chewed out. Was he happy turning over a new leaf and becoming goody-fucking-two-shoes? No, not by a long shot, but spending just a few months in that prison taught him that maybe he should watch his fucking step a bit, even though getting out also included some unconventional tactics by sleazy-slick lawyers. Important thing: Sammi had it coming and he’s out now, he needs to stay out.

Except right now he’s considering manslaughter 

He’s standing in the bathroom, looking down in mourning to the pile of ginger hair on the bathroom floor, hair clipper still hanging off the wall where it’s plugged in. He bolts to his room, glaring at where Ian is lounging on the bed, looking deflated, newly buzz cut. He had some bandaging wrapped over his forehead like some sort of bandana.

“What the  _ fuck,  _ Gallagher?” Ian looks up, a loopy smile curling over his face as he drums his fingers against his bare stomach half mindedly, at the skin peeking out from his rumpled shirt. Mickey swears that’s meant to distract him from blowing up in Ian’s face.

“Hey, Mick.”

“You  _ do  _ fucking know that they won’t let you enlist under any fucking circumstances ever again? What’s with the fucking hair?” His anger, despite himself, was sizzling out with how tired Ian came off. He’s been doing night shifts due to them paying almost double, had even started letting some of them bleed into the evening, spending almost 24 hours in either an ambulance or a hard cot in the station. Mickey was wondering if Ian came here of his own volition or if they had to force him to go home. He shrugged his jacket off and threw it to the side, going over and letting his hand run through barely-there hairs on Ian’s head, scowling at the flakes of blood he found closer to his forehead.

“Your head alright?”

Ian sniffed, succumbing to letting his eyes drift closed again. He’s kept them open for an hour or so now, and even if it was only about 6 pm, he was waiting up for Mickey. He felt phlegmatic as a fucking zombie, but he knew his body wasn’t cruel enough to let him drift away now that Mickey was here. He lazily gestured up to his hair.

“Drunk got hit by a car but didn’t want to take the ambulance. Didn’t want to pay the bill. I tried to help him out anyway but he grabbed my hair and slammed me into the fucking asphalt. I’m fine, just got scratched up.” Ian hissed when Mickey pulled his head forward, vaguely fussing around where the bandage met his hair before he smiled and melted into the doting. “What you think of the hair?”

“What do I fucking think? I’m thinking of how I can glue it back on without you looking like one of Sid’s toys. Fucking seriously? A drunk bastard grabbing it  _ once  _ means  _ this  _ drunk bastard can’t grab it ever again? That’s cruel.” 

Ian’s whole face was swallowed in a smile, his gut going mushy.

“You watched Toy Story?” He quickly rolled up into a loose protective position when Mickey raised his fist, seeing Mickey’s smile and giving him a teasing one back. He uncurled and sat up, wrapping his arms around Mickey and pressing their lips together, the mood doing a 180 from playful to loving as Ian fell back, pulling Mickey with him. Their foreheads collided softly and Ian whined exaggeratedly, pulling away to pout, Mickey leaning over him with a raised but unimpressed eyebrow.

“Can you take the bandage off? It’s giving me a headache - tied too tight.”

“Don’t you have to keep it on for however fuckin’ long?” Mickey chided, already reaching round to undo it.

“Sue only tidied me up so she could give me shit while she did it. Hey, you should keep an eye on her; she’s basically just you with a vag.”

“I’m pretty fucking sure the _vag_ thing keeps her at bay.”

“Dunno, man, sometimes feels like her cock is bigger than mine.” Ian flinched after a few go-arounds of Mickey unwrapping the bandage, it unsticking from the small bit of scabbed over blood littered by his hairline.

“Ah, that’s nothing, thought the road-rash’d be worse.” 

“Yeah, but Trevor’s going to kill me. Supposed to meet with some hoity-toity business people for dinner about kid money. The fuck do I look like?” Mickey sat back, furrowing his brows in mock thought, turning Ian’s head via his chin to examine him.

“Like...God fucks up soldiers, cause America loves fags.” Mickey grinned, Ian staying silent until he caught on, suppressing a grin as he huffed. 

“Yeah. Gonna tell them I got attacked by queer-bashers.”

“Pretty sure the sympathy angle doesn’t work when dealing with rich people - all psychopaths.”

“Gotta keep up an image, help the needy.”

“Yeah, whatever, Army. God, you look fucking stupid, is what you look like.” Mickey sighed, leaning down to kiss right under the bloodied skin. With the bandage now off Mickey was able to see the hairs Ian couldn’t get, could see how botched and uneven everything was.

“Up. You look like you let a toddler buzz you.” Ian was halfway through complaining when he was halfway out the door, Mickey doing most of the leg work to get them to the bathroom. Ian was unceremoniously shoved to sit down on the edge of the bathtub, his shirt tugged off shortly after and soon the noise of the clippers filled his ears as he felt the vibrations sliding along his head. Looking at the tiny hairs falling into the bathtub and on his shoulders, he was thankful that Mickey undressed him, god there was nothing worse than getting those short and needling hairs stuck in a shirt. They spread like a virus, he still remembers occasionally cringing in his Gallagher house bed, when feeling the tiniest of itchy pricks push into his skin uncomfortably. There was a time when he and Lip were early teens and they clipped Carl in his sleep, only to have the hair sprinkled by Carl himself onto every bed in the household, couch too.

_ “Shedding like a dog, marking my territory.”  _ Ian could think of worse ways for Carl to mark his territory, so touche. 

Ian was snapped out of his reminisce by warm water being sprayed in his face before the showerhead moved to his shoulders, getting rid of what Mickey couldn’t brush away.

“You smell like shit. Get undressed and shower.” 

But Ian stayed put, lazily raising an unimpressed eyebrow and Mickey mirroring him in the action. Mickey huffed, putting up the showerhead and putting in the drain stopper. He put a hand on the back of Ian’s head, effectively protecting him from cracking his skull open when Mickey pushed him back into the tub, Ian’s legs going up and making it easy for Mickey to fully undress him.

Ian continued being a petulant brat, staying in the tub with his spine bent at a surely uncomfortable angle as the water slowly rose to engulf his ears, gangly legs still dangling out and about.

“Fuckin really?” Silence. “Fine. Then  _ drown.”  _ Mickey grinned, grabbing the showerhead again and spraying Ian in the face -  _ again.  _ Ian sputtered as it went up his nose, reluctantly dragging his legs in and slinking over to properly lay in the bath as it kept filling out at a gradual pace, currently barely managing to drown his hips in the hot water.

“Thought you’d be the one doing the waterboarding in this relationship, Army.” 

Ian groaned; “Is  _ Army  _ a thing again?”

“Dunno, Gallagher,” Mickey made a show of trying to grab at Ian’s hair, to accentuate the point of there  _ not fucking being anything to grab,  _ “is it?” Ian all but pouted and slunk deeper into the tub to get away from Mickey just scratching at his scalp, the water barely reaching his bottom lip. Mickey gave him a light noogie before pushing off the tub, heading into the bedroom to actually get out of his work clothes. He got down to his boxers and tugged on his shirt, interrupted from doing anything more when he heard a panicked yell from Ian:

“Mick!!”

Mickey dropped the pants in his hands and rushed over to the small bathroom to see Ian, calm as fucking day, looking at him with the eyes that immediately told Mickey that Ian fucking wanted something, something Mickey probably won’t be too pleased with.

“Give me a fucking heart attack, why don’t you?” Mickey spat, already pissy with how Ian had deceived him into coming over. Negotiations won’t be easy, Ian decides and proceeds to just go for it.

“Trevor said I can bring a hot plus one. To the dinner.” Ian made his face go as soft and pleading as he could, Mickey taking none of it.

“Oh, so now I’m a trophy wife?” Mickey would’ve huffed and walked away, but seeing the hard set determination sparkling on Ian made him settle in, leaning against the door frame. Ian scrunched his eyebrows in mock confusion.

“You weren’t before?”

And that’s how Ian Gallagher was fucking drowned. 

Mickey came over quickly, putting his hand on Ian’s head to shove him down into the water, Ian laughing and flailing as he tried and succeeded in getting away without lungfuls of water. He started laughing funny, doing the laugh he pulled when he was happy and caught off guard, it sounding more like wet sobs than laughing as he failed to get proper breaths between chuckles. He was clutching at Mickey’s wrist to save himself from being drowned, calming down briefly but still grinning, bringing Mickey’s defenses down to nil. 

“Will you?” 

Mickey tried to wriggle free but soon saw that to be futile, frowning and sighing before he let himself kneel down by the bathtub, putting his chin down on the edge. Ian idly locked their fingers together, hands falling in to stir at the water by his stomach, Mickey’s skin breaking out in goosebumps at the unexpected warmth. 

“Got shit to do.”

“At 7 PM on a Saturday?” Ian shot straight through Mickey’s bullshit, not even mentioning that he didn’t say the time earlier. Mickey used his free hand to rub a thumb under his bottom lip, eyes flickering away. “Come on Mick.” 

“Yeah, cause I’m the ideal image of upstanding fucking citizenship,” Mickey pulled his hand away from his face, wiggling his fingers in front of Ian to put on full display the grey letters spelling FUCK out over his knuckles.

“And?” Mickey was tempted to skitter away when Ian took his other hand, intertwining it just as the first in his own tight grip. Overly intimate, not practical. “Everyone loves the thug with a heart of gold, helping the gay kids in times of need.”

“Why should I go, huh?” Ian frowned at him, sitting up straight to look down at him proper, letting go of one of Mickey’s hands to slide a hand through Mickey’s untamed mop, productless for the day and falling in every direction. It was a calming gesture, getting Mickey’s scowl to soften ever so.

“Mick, these kids are a lot like you.”

Mickey flinched away, half-heartedly throwing Ian a glare, expecting some taunting, degrading bullshit. But Ian kept his face soft and his hand gentle as it continued to do a half-assed job of water-slicking Mickey’s hair into place. Most importantly he kept his mouth shut. After a tense second or so Mickey deflated, looking like a sad dog as he put his chin back down on the bathtub edge, eyes dragging around everywhere, from the thick off-white plastic of the tub to Ian’s pinkening skin. He didn’t dwell on the comment, decided it better to leave that can of worms for later. 

“FIne.” 

Mickey didn’t get how bringing subpar eye-candy to meet repressed queens was going to get them to throw more money at them, but he saw that he was fighting an uphill battle here if Ian was digging shit like that up. Ian wasn’t stupid, he knew this scene needed something big to lift it off the ground. He hid a grin as he reached over, ignoring Mickey’s protests as he hooked his arms under Mickey’s armpits and dragged him into the tub. Mickey’s shirt - oh, nevermind, that’s  _ clearly  _ one of Ian’s old shirts, dark blue with a purple owl staring back at him - was soaked right through, clinging to him as he fussed and wiggled in Ian’s tight grip.

“Ian!” But the cry went unheard as Ian laughed and held him, tugging him fully into the water, both of them barely fit in the small tub. Mickey had to sit on Ian’s stomach with how Ian’s legs were bent, knees out of the water so he could lay down again, grinning up at Mickey. 

“Love you.”

“You’re a fucking deadman,” Mickey grumbled lowly before he was once more reaching out for another round of Drown The GInger.

**Author's Note:**

> suggest some things for the domesticity series, im enjoying writing it a fuckin lot :))
> 
> or not for the series, all comments and suggestions are appreciated <3


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